Linking continuum-scale state of wetting to pore-scale contact angles in porous media.

Autor: Sun C; School of Minerals & Energy Resources Engineering, University of New South Wales, Kensington, NSW 2052, Australia., McClure JE; Advanced Research Computing, Virginia Polytechnic Institute & State University, Blacksburg, VA 24061, USA., Mostaghimi P; School of Minerals & Energy Resources Engineering, University of New South Wales, Kensington, NSW 2052, Australia., Herring AL; Department of Applied Mathematics, Australian National University, Canberra, ACT 2600, Australia., Shabaninejad M; Department of Applied Mathematics, Australian National University, Canberra, ACT 2600, Australia., Berg S; Rock & Fluid Physics, Shell Global Solutions International B.V., Grasweg 31, 1031 HW Amsterdam, the Netherlands; Department of Earth Science & Engineering, Imperial College London, London SW7 2AZ, UK; Department of Chemical Engineering, Imperial College London, London SW7 2AZ, UK., Armstrong RT; School of Minerals & Energy Resources Engineering, University of New South Wales, Kensington, NSW 2052, Australia. Electronic address: ryan.armstrong@unsw.edu.au.
Jazyk: angličtina
Zdroj: Journal of colloid and interface science [J Colloid Interface Sci] 2020 Mar 01; Vol. 561, pp. 173-180. Date of Electronic Publication: 2019 Nov 30.
DOI: 10.1016/j.jcis.2019.11.105
Abstrakt: Hypothesis: Wetting phenomena play a key role in flows through porous media. Relative permeability and capillary pressure-saturation functions show a high sensitivity to wettability, which has different definitions at the continuum- and pore-scale. We hypothesize that the wetting state of a porous medium can be described in terms of topological arguments that constrain the morphological state of immiscible fluids, which provides a direct link between the continuum-scale metrics of wettability and pore-scale contact angles.
Experiments: We perform primary drainage and imbibition experiments on Bentheimer sandstone using air and brine. Topological properties, such as Euler characteristic and interfacial curvature are measured utilizing X-ray micro-computed tomography at irreducible air saturation. We also present measurements for the United States Bureau of Mines (USBM) index, capillary pressure and pore-scale contact angles. Additional studies are performed using two-phase Lattice Boltzmann simulations to test a wider range of wetting conditions.
Findings: We demonstrate that contact angle distributions for a porous multiphase system can be predicted within a few percent difference of directly measured pore-scale contact angles using the presented method. This provides a general framework on how continuum-scale data can be used to describe the geometrical state of fluids within porous media.
(Copyright © 2019 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.)
Databáze: MEDLINE
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